The study The study "Staff turnover in technology companies and proposals to reduce it" elaborated by Engineer Pablo Machordom under the tutorship of MBA Engineer Alejandro Laborde, and approved in August 2020 as a requirement for the completion of the Master's Degree in Information Technology Management at the Catholic University of Uruguay, consulted 173 employees and 23 companies in the field of information technology.
Among the main conclusions reached in the research, it is suggested that the turnover generated in the sector can be explained in part by the high labor demand characteristic of the IT industry. At the same time, this is complemented by the availability of new personnel selection mechanisms, such as the use of the Linkedin network, which generates that employees in the sector receive job offers even when they are not actively looking for a job change.
Another finding indicates that the motivations of employees when changing jobs are not only salary, but also professional growth, the search for new challenges, the improvement of the role or the variation of tasks and technologies, are intensely mentioned as motivators for job change.
It was also found that more junior roles tend to stay less time in their jobs than more senior roles. On the other hand, while the possibility of task and technology variation is more attractive to younger employees, professional challenges as well as a significant salary tend to be more highly valued for more senior roles.
In terms of recommendations to mitigate high employee turnover in the sector, it is suggested:
- Active management of turnover: incorporating the level of turnover as an annual strategic objective of the company and/or human resources area.
- Employee satisfaction improvement plans: to develop together with employees the improvement plans to be implemented, involving them in the process of prioritization and definition of initiatives to be implemented.
- Training: offer training in multiple areas of development to employees to further develop in their areas of interest.
- Better selection processes: ensure that the job description is in line with the current job situation and include enough steps in the process to ensure alignment of expectations with the employee (expectation problems shorten the expected length of the employment relationship by one third)
- Leadership: provide recurrent leadership training to company leaders and incorporate employee evaluation of their direct bosses in their performance evaluations.
- Impact mitigation: avoid generating indispensable personnel and detect high-performing employees with whom to apply specific strategies to prevent them from leaving the company.
For inquiries and to deepen in the content of the research, you can communicate directly with the author at the following email address: pablo4360@gmail.com